Jenna Sauers

Rooney Mara is on Vogue's February cover. It is her second cover of the magazine in 15 months. The profile within is kind of a snooze — but Mara, who describes herself as shy and anxious, does talk about how little she likes dressing up and tending to the more public parts of her job.

"It's kind of an annoying part of the job — because I'm not a model, and I don't want to be. I didn't try to be a style icon. I'm just not that interested in that world. But it does matter, and either I can fight that or I just have to accept that it is a part of my job."

"I have to walk out onto the middle of this carpet and there are all these photographers, and they're all screaming at you. And usually there's a party at the other end of it, so it's not even like I have solace at the end of the carpet! It's like then I have to walk into my other nightmare!"

Kati Nescher made the cover of the February issue of British Vogue
. The German-Russian model shot the issue with Patrick Demarchelier in New York during Hurricane Sandy. [Vogue UK
]
Girls
costume designer Jenn Rogien explains Shoshanna's fascinator, which she sourced from Etsy:

"We did a lot of research looking into what kind of tiny hats are available, and we ended up doing a custom-made tiny hat for Shoshanna based off of a couple of different bits and pieces."

Oh gee, it definitely looks like Forever 21 took a piece of original work by an art student named Kelly Bastow and put it on a t-shirt. Lame. And most likely illegal! But hardly unusual behavior
for that particular company. [Funeral Dreams
]

As expected, the global luxury conglomerate PPR has acquired a 51% stake in Christopher Kane's namesake label. The value of the investment and its terms were not disclosed; PPR is run by François-Henri Pinault and also owns Stella McCartney, Balenciaga, and Alexander McQueen, among other brands. PPR's ownership will fund the company's growth, including the anticipated launch of a second ready-to-wear line and the opening of the first Christopher Kane boutique in 2014. Kane, a graduate of Central St. Martins, is one of the most critically lauded of the emerging U.K. designers. [WWD]

Carla Bruni's agent says her musical career "suffered" because of her position as the first lady of France. [Vogue UK]

Julianne Moore says playing Sarah Palin made her think about how men and women in public life are perceived differently based on the way they dress and groom themselves:

"I absolutely feel that women in politics are unfairly judged based on their physical appearance and fashion choices. Nobody talks about how [men in politics] wear their hair or whether or not their outfits are attractive."

Well, people do talk about that, actually — plenty of folks made fun of Paul Ryan's baggy dress shirts and Obama's Dad jeans. "But critiques of men on the basis of their appearance do not have the same impact as similar critiques of women due to structural, sexist inequalities in our culture," Moore could have gone on to say. [Fashionista]

Canadian model Chantal Stafford-Abbott:

"I don't know what I'm going to be doing the next day so my schedule is always super last minute. I can't say, "I can have lunch with you two days from now" because I don't know if I can. It's kind of hard in that sense because I don't feel like I have control of my schedule. But at the same time, if I had a 9-to-5, I probably would be complaining a lot more."

The London Design Museum has nominated the fall/winter collections of Giles, Craig Green, Commes des Garçons, Prada, Dior, and Proenza Schouler, plus the Louis Vuitton/Yayoi Kusama capsule collection, Jacqueline Durran's costume designs for Anna Karenina, and the documentary Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel for its Design of the Year awards. [Telegraph]

Mallory Hagan, the latest winner of that grand old academic scholarship competition known as Miss America, will have to take time off from her studies at the Fashion Institute of Technology to discharge her duties. [WWD]

A Harvard Business School graduate named Halsey Schroeder has launched Halsbrook, an online retailer targeting women over the age of 40 who have the money to drop $300-$1000+ on designer threads. [NYTimes]

Burberry had a pretty good quarter. Revenue and sales both increased year-on-year by significant margins — 6.8%, to $986.9 million, and 11.3%, to $747 million, respectively — but wholesale revenues fell by 7.7%. Growth in Europe and the Americas was essentially flat. [WWD]

Gucci is opening its first store in Rio de Janeiro, its fifth in Brazil. [WWD]